Let's try to get started here. So, we're continuing on with the Christ of the Covenants book, and we've had a kind of few fits and starts with this, with meetings and weather delays and things like that. So, why don't we just take a minute and kind of review where we've been. And the first review is to see who paid attention and was listening last week in the sermon. because Pastor Biggs did a quick review of the covenants in his sermon if you were paying attention. So one of the things he said was that when we look at covenants, it's all of grace, very good, from from creation or commencement right so we can say commencement or creation we'll just put a big C up there to consummation the other C very good so you got that one good good and the covenant is it's something by God it's Initiated. Wow, you guys. Pastor Biggs, they're paying attention. You weren't even hearing she's getting the sermons. You other people have no excuse. Initiated by God and seen to. Another C word. Completion. Very good. Seen to completion by God. Okay. And that God relates to his people by Covenant, that's a very easy one. If we didn't get that one, our class would be failing, I think. All right, and what do the people do? To God's covenant, they respond by faith. Very good. Did I get those points okay, Charles? Is that pretty much what you said? That's what I thought, so. See, and you weren't even really making a full-blown covenant sermon. It was just in there, because you can't get away from it, you know? In fact, before I really understood the covenant, the Old Testament to me was kind of a mystery, because it just, you know, why didn't God just go right from Adam to Jesus? What's with all these other things in there? You know, it just didn't logically make sense. But then when you understand the covenant, it makes perfect sense. So that brings us to the second part of the review. And we looked at what is a covenant, and what is a covenant? Anybody know what a covenant might be? Right, a bond in blood, sovereignly administered. And the extent of the covenant was the next thing we looked at. And what is the extent of the covenant? Right, it's for all time. There's one overarching eternal covenant, a gracious covenant, that covers, you know, that's like the big umbrella that's covering everything that's under here. We need to remember that, that, you know, there may be sub-covenants or, you know, specific way it's worked out, but it's all part of one overarching covenant of grace. And the extent is for all time, from eternity past, to eternity future, okay? Was there ever a time that God did not deal with man or with creation through covenant? No, so any dealings God has with man are always through covenant. Okay, so we need to remember that as well. As Robertson Every time I pick up this book, I read, oh, Pat Robertson. And I think, okay, we wouldn't want his Christ of the Covenants book. I said, oh, Palmer Robertson. That's what happens when you just have a couple hours of sleep. So if we look at, so we see the covenant for all time, overarching everything. And then we have the unity of the covenant. And these are some things that are the specific outworking of this one overarching covenant. And these are very important. This is the key to understanding the connection between the Old Testament and the New Testament. If you don't get this, then it's going to be a mystery. So we have, in the unity, 1 M one mediator, okay? Alrighty. One mediator, one people. One people, that's right. And one salvation, okay? I remember a book I read that really kind of hit me by a two by four, was one of the chapters in this book, it was actually a book on infant baptism, but one of the chapters was, that chapter heading was, Moses was a Christian. And I'm like, what? He's in the Old Testament. So, like I said, it makes sense. All right, and this is, of course, very important. The same God of the Old Testament and the New Testament, okay? We don't want any Martians here, okay? Even your favorite Martians, we don't want them, okay? What was Marcionism? Anybody remember what that heresy was if you've been through church history class? Yeah, the extreme, I mean, basically you had two gods. You had the god of the Old Testament, which was a god of wrath and fear, and then in the New Testament, Jesus was a god of love and grace, and God dealt differently with the people in the Old Testament as he did with the people in the New Testament. But if you have one mediator, one people, and one way of salvation, then you don't have any, you know, you have that unity between it. Okay? Any questions? Or... All right. All right. And then we have unity, but we also have diversity in the covenants, and that's the next thing we looked at. In the Old Testament, what was this characterized by? Promise. Very good. All right. Bob will have you teach a class. And what is the New Testament characterized by? Fulfillment. Very good. It's a lot harder when I don't take time. Sorry. That's why I did this ahead of time so you could read it. So, you know, that's why we talk about types and shadows and then in the New Testament how everything is fulfilled, okay? And what kind of revelation do we see as we work through that working of the covenant in the Old Testament and into the New? Progressive, okay, very good. doesn't mean that Jesus says that the government should take all your money and give it to people. What this means, progressive, is that, I think Pastor Biggs, you explained it once, like if you go to some tourist place that has an overlook or something, and they have those little binocular things you gotta keep putting quarters in, you know. And they usually have a dial in them, so you look through and you dial and as you're dialing the picture, you know, finally comes into focus. He related that that's kinda like what the Old Testament is. As the Old Testament revelation progresses to the new, it's like God's letting you dial in and see more clearly. I think the other one you used was which professor said, it's like the Old Testament, it's like a dimly lit cave. You know, you've got a torch that doesn't have a lot of light. You can see there's some things in there, but you can't fully make them out. So anyway, so that's that idea of things progressively being revealed. And because of that, what does that mean? It means each time we look at a subsequent covenant, okay, what are we doing? to the previous covenant expanding okay it expands okay it expands it doesn't replace or supplant okay so you know if we look at the you know the covenant of Abraham today it didn't It didn't replace the previous covenants, the covenant to Noah, the covenant with Adam. It didn't replace them. It just provides more information. It provides more detail. It's dialing in the focus a little bit. Okay. All right. And then we look at, uh, started to look at the various covenants, uh, a little bit of terminology difference, the way Robertson, uh, uses them. And so we tried to stick to him, but, uh, um, We started off with the covenant of creation. And this was important because God established some things in how man would relate to God and how man was to live in the world. Do you remember some of the things that he established here? Labor? OK. Very good. Anybody else who didn't teach the class? What? Sabbath. Very good. Sabbath. You know, they need to make these like three feet higher. I don't know what the deal is. Sabbath. And one other important one. Marriage. Very good. Okay. So if we had, if these covenants didn't build on them, then How would we build on labor and Sabbath and marriage? That was the covenant with Adam. We don't have to worry about that anymore. All right. And of course, in the covenant of creation, we had the promise of life for obedience. But we know that Adam failed. And so after this, the covenant of commencement came into place. And we see the first gospel. message in the Bible in Genesis 3.15 and this begins the battle between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent. Very good. Alright, and we see this playing out. All you classical scholars, you know, the City of God, City of Man, we see this played out you know, many ways. All righty. And then after the covenant commencement with Adam, last week we looked at the covenant of preservation with Noah, where, you know, God preserves the people and makes a covenant with Noah. And so today we're going to look at God's covenant with Abraham that Palmer Robertson calls the covenant of promise okay and we'll do this over the next two weeks we'll just kinda sketch it this week and then next week Elder Mitch is gonna talk about the sign of the covenant with Abraham which you know which is a very important thing so we'll spend a whole week on that as well so for all you people that have come to Pastor Big's Friday morning class you guys should get this one You know, if we look at Abraham and the covenant promise, there's three key elements that we see. Now, there's a couple different ways you could say it. So if you want to remember it with alliteration, they're all Ps, or you can remember it the other way. So does anybody know what we have here? People, okay. And what would this also be? seed, okay? And these are the key elements you want to look at in this covenant and subsequent covenants to see these themes continue to play out. Alright, so we have people or seed. And then what's next? Place. Alright. Or land. Alright. And then the last one. Could be a presence. I would call it presence. God with us. OK. It had to fit a P. Sorry. You know. And or the blessing. OK. All right. The annual principle. But it didn't work. So. like to Smith right that's right the P is silent so the P commanual but the P is silent so that's right right so we're gonna see a people a place and the presence of God or seed land in blessing and we've already seen seed over here that you know that that theme is important in being expanded here so already So did everybody get a handout? There were handouts in the back. Anybody need one? All right, so we're going to take a look at the covenant of promise with Abraham. And got the questions that we're going to look at on the handout. OK. And we're gonna look at Genesis 12, Genesis 15, Jeremiah 34, Hebrews 9, Matthew 26, and Luke 22. We're gonna go through all those, hopefully, in the next 26 minutes. Would somebody like to read Genesis 12, one to four? All right, and how about... Genesis 15. We don't need to read all of Genesis 15. I forgot to chop that off. I'll do Genesis 15. Jeremiah 34, 17 to 20. Okay. Thank you, Micah. Hebrews 9, 15 to 20. Elizabeth, very good. Matthew 26, 28. Jim, thanks. and Luke 22 20 okay grace thank you alright very good alright so let's read Genesis 12 1 to 4 okay very good so the first thing we want to look at is how is God's sovereignty revealed in this beginning relationship he has with Abram at the time, not Abraham, Abram. What are some of the elements we see here? Yes, Cheryl. Right, he shows up and says go. Okay, so God initiates, as Pastor Biggs reminded us last week. It's sovereignty, we see the sovereignty of God at work here. How do we see the tie-in with the seed, land, and blessing, or people, place, and presence? Yeah, okay. He tells them, yeah, it's like, I'm gonna show you the land. Go from your country to a land I will show you. Okay. All right. And as Pastor Biggs remind us, what are the people we do when God works through us through covenant, we respond by faith. What does Abram do? He went. He went. So he hears the word of God, he believes the word of God, and he goes. Okay? And just imagine, here you are, you're 75 years old, you've lived in one place, and God shows up and says, go. You know, that takes faith to do that. Okay, so we see God's initiating grace in his dealing with Abram. We see that he will make Abram's seed prosper. He will send Abram to a land or a place, and God will be with him. God will be with him. All right, and then the next thing we're gonna look at is Genesis 15. And this is the inauguration of the covenant, the formal inauguration. And I'll go ahead and read this. And so we'll start at Genesis 15, verse one. After these things, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision. Fear not, Abram, I am your shield. Your reward shall be very great. But Abram said, O Lord, what will you give me? For I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eleazar of Damascus. Behold, you've given me no offspring. A member of my household will be my heir. And behold, the world of the Lord came to him and said, this man shall not be your heir. Your very own son shall be your heir. He brought him outside and said, look toward the heaven. Number the stars if you're able. Then he said to him, so shall your offspring be. And he believed the Lord and counted it to him. as righteousness. All right. And then we go a little bit farther down and God tells Abram to bring a group of animals, a goat, a ram, turtle dove, pigeon, and tells him, cut them in half, lay them in pieces, kind of in, you know, kind of in a, in two sides there in a row. So there's a, a, a walkway between them. And, uh, And then continuing on in verse 12, as the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell on Abram, and behold, dreadful and great darkness fell upon him. The Lord said to Abram, know for certain that your offspring will be soldiers in a land that is not theirs. They will be servants there. They will be afflicted for 400 years. But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward, they shall come out with great possessions. As for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace. You shall be buried in a good old age. they shall come back here in the fourth generation for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete when the sun had gone down it was dark behold a smoking fire pot and flaming torch passed between these pieces and on that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram saying to your offspring I give this land from the river of Egypt to the great river to the river of Euphrates and the land of the Canaanites, the Canaanites, the Ketamites, the Hittites, Perizzites, the Refim, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Gergesites, the Jezebites, Jebusites, and the Mosquitobites. All right. So this was the formal inauguration of the covenant. And there's a lot of detail here we need to look at. And it's, you know, very important detail. Okay. So, What are some of the elements or circumstances that we see with this covenant ceremony? Is there blood? A lot of blood. Yep, a lot of blood, okay. Is God making promises to Abram? Yeah, he talks about go outside and look in the sky. Can you count the stars? You're gonna have more descendants than that. How about the place or the land? Very specific, right? He tells them all these peoples are gonna be displaced by you. They're gonna be the land where you are and I will dwell with you, okay? And something else very, very important. Who passes between the pieces in this covenant ceremony? Does that seem like counterintuitive? Who would we think, just naturally, who would you think should pass between the pieces? Yeah, you would think Abram. Hey, God's saying, do this, obey me. I'm going to do all these things, and well, I will seal that by walking between the pieces like you asked. But it's just the opposite. God is the one who passes between the pieces. Why is that important? God is the one who assures that the covenant promises will be kept. Okay? Not Abram. It's not up to Abram to make sure the covenant... Now, does Abram still have responsibility? Yes, he has a responsibility. Respond by faith. And we know he did because it says that God counted it to him as righteousness. But God is the one who obligates himself by passing between the pieces. So we see, again, this sovereign administration of the covenant. And we see that it's a gracious covenant, that God is the one who says, I will ensure that the covenant is kept. OK? Any questions on that? All right. So what are the implications of this promise in this inauguration? And how do they include an oath of self-malediction? What is God basically saying as he passed through the pieces here? Right, right. that's why it's called self-malediction and it may as it be to me like these animals if I break this so yes right again yeah again we see the sovereign it's you know it's there are two there are two people in this covenant but there's one God, who's doing everything, who's the one who initiates and who says, it may be to me if I don't keep my covenant. So we see life and death consequences. We saw life and death consequences back in the covenant of creation. We see life and death consequences here. And who's got Jeremiah 34, 17 to 20? OK. Thank you. Great. So here we see in Jeremiah's time, basically, the same type of covenantal ceremony being referred to and having life and death consequences. And Robertson talks about the idea that some people would say, well, the covenant God made with Abraham, with Abram, that was just sort of a historical, reference point. It wasn't really binding on the rest of Israel, but here we see in Jeremiah a clear reference to the same type of covenant ceremony with the same type of life and death consequences. Okay, any questions so far? Alright, let's look at Exodus 24, 1-8. Who's got that? Did I get someone for that? OK, Jenny. Great. I'm sorry. I missed that one. Go ahead. Thanks, Jenny. OK, so what type of similarities elements, similar elements, do we see with the inauguration of the Mosaic Covenant and the Abrahamic Covenant? What are some of the same elements? Blood. Yes, blood once again. A bond in blood. Blood, blood, blood. Blood everywhere. Blood on the people. Blood on the altar. What else do we see? God's sovereignty. Okay, so the people respond, right? They respond by faith and obedience. All that Moses, you said, we will do. Okay. What else do we see? What about Moses? What is his role here? Mediator, okay. Now, is Moses, is he a different mediator? Or is he, you know, thinking about, well, Moses only was a mediator of this covenant, but he has no importance to us today. Again, you know, promise and fulfillment. You know, Jesus, of course, is the Moses. All right, so again, similarities. We see the blood. We see a mediator. We see God making promises. We see the people responding by faith. All right. Any questions so far? Okay. So now let's tie this to the New Testament, okay? Because again, we can look at all these things as promise types, shadows, but we want to make sure we see the connection to the New Testament. where all this gets fulfilled. So Hebrews 9, 15 to 20. Okay? All right, so the author of Hebrews is looking back to the application of blood on the people. And we're gonna see now how this is applied through Jesus. Matthew 26, 28. Okay? And then Luke 22 20. Okay? So we see with Moses, the blood basically spread on the people and on the altar. What do you think is the reference to Jesus saying, my blood's poured out? Why would he have used that language? Yes. Yeah. I mean, it's obviously, uh, the, uh, the Jews would understand the significance of the blood being poured out from the sacrifice. Okay. So this is a direct, it's a reference of course, to the sacrificial language that we've seen in the old Testament. And we've seen, especially with the covenant of Abraham, uh, and, uh, the curses of the covenant are placed upon a sacrificial victim. When I was considering that, one of the things I thought about was, sometimes at communion we'll sing, at the Lamb's high feast we sing. one of the verses says praise we him whose love divine gives his sacred blood for wine gives his body for the feast Christ the victim Christ the priest so you know I mean it's not he's not just the mediator he's actually you know the mediator and the sacrifice both so we can sing victim and and and priest so Okay, and why do you think Jesus calls this a new covenant? Why didn't he just say this is the exact same as the old here? What makes it new? Okay, the fulfillment, right, this is a once for all sacrifice. After Jesus, there's no further covenants, no further need. Yes. Amen. Amen. But now if you read that, and you have no understanding of the Old Testament, it doesn't pack the same punch, does it? So we see here the New Covenant is because it's fulfilled. Not only does Christ take the curse of the Old Covenant, or the curse of that you know breaking the covenant promises but he also gives a blessing to his people okay so Jesus is really the fulfillment of the covenant that we see with Abraham you know as God promised he sovereignly provides the once and for all sacrifice so Jesus blood is shed so that God's word of promise to Abraham is fulfilled OK. Oh, yes, Charles. Amen. Mm hmm. Yeah, Bill. You saw my notes. That was the last thing I wanted to talk about is how do we see seed land in blessing or people place in presence? How do we see that expanded in the new covenant? The place that Abram went to, the land that he was promised, is it greater today? I mean, it's the whole world, right? Jesus said, go into the whole world, okay? How about the people? Now, Abram was blessed with descendants as numerous as the stars, but in the Old Testament, those people were primarily Israelites, right? What do we see today? Every tribe, every tongue, every nation will be worshiping God at the throne. And we can see the people from the sense that we had a narrower group of people with the nation of Israel. And today, the New Testament church is so much greater. But it's still one people. It's still one people. The church didn't in any way replace Old Testament Israelites. It's just, again, an expansion. a broadening, more graciousness. Who had their hand up? What's that? Oh, yeah, yes. Absolutely, absolutely. So God dwelt in a special way in the Old Testament with his people, but now he dwells with each believer through the Holy Spirit. All righty. Any other thoughts or... Yeah, Bill. Yeah. Yeah, it is. Amen. Well, this is the key right here. The New Testament is just greatly expanding what God has already told. It's not supplanting or replacing. Yeah. Yep. Yeah, that's the last part of that, the good place to end, that the people, the place, and the presence of God in the new heavens and the new earth will be complete. It will be completed. It will have full consummation. And this, yes. Yeah, Mary. Yes. Yeah. Yeah, we could even, you could even do it as, there's a, there's a promise to Abram of his seeds, all the people, numerous as the stars, and but to his seed, namely Christ, so. All right, well, we're out of time. Any last thoughts? All right, well, let's close. Lord, we thank you so much that you have revealed yourself and dealt with us through covenant. and we thank you that you are the initiator of this and you are the guarantor of this as well that it's not up to us to labor and strive to keep into your good good standing but that we know through your sovereign grace that Jesus has fulfilled all the laws demands and all the demands that you made through this covenant even to shedding his blood for us so we thank you for that And we pray that you might help us and help us as we read the scriptures and hear sermons that we would see covenant everywhere and understand how you have dealt with your people this way. We pray in Jesus' name, amen.